Happy Friday and St. Patricks Day guys! Instead of talking about my recent food adventures and upcoming events (*cough cough Taste of Tennis*) I wanted to chat with you today about something more personal. Nothing incredibly heavy so don’t worry, just something that’s been on my mind lately. Also this is more of a life inspiration post rather than tips, but take it as you will. Here goes!
If you follow me on social media you probably already know that I run a company called Collars4Change. Starting up C4C really opened my eyes in a big way to the world of animal rescue and animal cruelty. Unfortunately this is a topic that’s so easy to breeze over, especially if you don’t own an animal in general. It’s easy to scroll past the sad Facebook posts and sponsored petitions. Also so much of what you see has to do with animals in other parts of the world like elephants and marine life, so it’s hard to really feel connected to the point where anything you could do would matter. That’s always going to be the issue unfortunately. I’ve been incredibly lucky to get very involved with the rescue community here in Miami, and have been able to reach organizations and rescue groups all over the country as well.
I feel great about what I’ve been able to do so far with C4C, but that’s also brought up the feeling that I could be doing more. Not only for animals, but in the way that more aspects of my life could be geared towards giving back. I realize how blessed I am to get to go to a safe clean beach anytime I want, to have access to amazing local produce, and to be surrounded by people who recycle and are animals lovers. It’s a lot! I sat down one night recently and made a list of new ways that I could potentially lower my carbon footprint, and contribute more to our environment, and here’s what I came up with.
Business – The first thing I did was look at all the paper I use on a daily basis. So bad, I know. In order to run my two companies C4C and The Rove Collective I definitely use a lot of paper supplies, so my solution here is to team up with more ec0-friendly brands. MooCards and EcoEnclose are the two I went with, so now when you receive a package from me you’ll get a 100% recycled business card, 100% recycled paper invoice, and 100% recycled packaging!
Home + Beauty – This one is tough and probably the hardest to change in an overall sense. But there are so many (BIG NAME) brands out there in both the home and beauty product worlds that still do animal testing and in addition to that, put crazy chemicals in everyday products. Say what you will about this, but knowing what products go in and on your body should be an important thing and isn’t something that yoga nuts and hippies worry about. I don’t want to make this post about guilt tripping or making anybody bad, but here are a few of the household product brands that really made me cringe – Arm & Hammer, Clorox, Comet, Febreze, Glade, Lysol, Tide, Windex… windex, are you kidding me? And then even worse, I got into the beauty list – Avon, Bobbi Brown, Covergirl, Estée Lauder, Head & Shoulders, L’Oréal, M.A.C. Cosmetics, Mary Kay, Maybelline, Pantene, Revlon, TRESemmé. Just shoot me, honestly. A few more just so you can really get the message here – ChapStick, Coppertone, Johnson & Johnson, Old Spice, Pampers, Vaseline and Vicks. We have a long way to go in this department people, and the only way we can change something like this is simply to stop buying these products. If you want to see a more up-beat list, here’s a look at all the awesome cruelty free brands, as well as eco-friendly companies working hard to make making a change easier for you!
Community – Like I said earlier, I’m really lucky at this point to live near some of the most amazing beaches and wildlife in the country. South Florida is really an incredible area and I’ve come to find that people here are very passionate about keeping the environment clean. I’m in the process of organizing a beach cleanup with my team from The Rove Collective, so if you live around the Stuart/Jupiter area let me know! If you don’t live near a beach though there are still so many ways to get involved. You can organize a community cleanup practically anywhere. I recently saw a cute one where all the kids from a local school in Miami were given a mason jar and their mission was to walk around a local park and fill their jar with trash. Precautions were taken of course so don’t worry about that. All the kids had on gloves etc. and there was plenty of adult supervision. You could cleanup a local park, neighborhood, forest area, mountain, really anywhere! Also there are always going to be tons of animal rescue organizations in your area you can donate to or volunteer at.
Overall, there are a ton of ways to get involved and give back and at the end of the day nothing is easier than just recycling in general. Pick one thing a month to try, or just start with making small changes. That’s the best way I can recommend to get started. Karma levels up and carbon footprint down! If you’ve got more ideas or ways to share with me I would love it. Leave me a comment here or follow my eco-journey on Instagram!
xx
